Universally Monstrous - The Invisible Man
by darnedchild
Summary: "This is the strangest thing I have ever seen," John marvelled. "Haven't seen," Sherlock corrected.


**A/N** : I started the Universally Monstrous series during last year's Sherlolly Halloween, but due to health reasons I only finished three of the nine Classic Universal Monsters. I finished Frankenstein earlier in 2019, so let's see if I can get the other five done for 2019 Sherlolly Halloween.

Not beta'd probably, because I keep forgetting to send these things out for edits before they're due.

**Universally Monstrous **

**The Invisible Man**

"This is the strangest thing I have ever seen," John marvelled.

"Haven't seen," Sherlock corrected.

John's bark of laughter was quickly cut off by the slam of a notebook hitting the nearest lab bench.

Molly Hooper's voice echoed through the small room. "Very funny. You said you were going to call John to help, Sherlock. Not to stand around making jokes."

"I don't believe the two are mutually exclusive." Sherlock did have the grace to look slightly repentant.

John cleared his throat. "Sorry. You're right. So, what happened to cause … that?" He waved his hand in the direction of what appeared to be Molly's animated clothing, complete with lab coat, hovering just above a seemingly empty pair of shoes.

The lab coat lifted its arm as if pointing toward Sherlock, and Molly spoke again. "Sherlock happened. One second I was cleaning up my workstation while he played around with chemicals he clearly should not have had access to; and the next, I'm invisible."

Sherlock rolled his eyes. "There was a bit more to it than that."

"All right. So tell me what you did, Sherlock, and then we can all figure out how to reverse it," John said, using his 'I'm a Serious Man of Medicine' voice.

The lab coat snorted.

Sherlock looked anywhere but at John. "Idon'tknow."

"Pardon?" John held his hand up to his ear. "I didn't catch that."

"I said, I don't know." Sherlock stomped over to the cabinets where various scientific bits and bobs were usually locked away from curious Consulting Detectives, but were now suspiciously hanging open.

"You don't… Are you serious?" John turned to the lab coat. "Is he serious?"

"Oh yes." Molly the talking lab coat moved to stand at Sherlock's side. "Sticky Fingers Holmes stole-"

"Borrowed," Sherlock was quick to interrupt.

"-my keys and gave himself access to Dr Griffin's equipment-"

"Which had been improperly cleaned and stored, so it clearly not my fault all those bottles fell out and broke."

"Which had been improperly stored with chemicals still inside, yes." The lab coat seemed to ignore the self-satisfied smile on Sherlock's face. Or didn't. It was impossible to tell since the two men could not see Molly's face. "However, if you hadn't been digging around where you shouldn't have been, none of this would have shattered all over the floor, and I wouldn't be in this state!"

"If it hadn't been you, it would have been someone else the next time that cabinet opened!" Sherlock countered, just as loudly.

"And that would have most likely been Dr Griffin, who would deserve it for being so careless in the first place!"

John ignored their bickering to kneel a respectable distance away from the mess on the floor. It had been at least half an hour since he'd received Sherlock's first text, and there was no way he hadn't been a final resort as far as sorting this out, therefore, the accident must have happened at least an hour prior. So why was the puddle still occasionally popping and hissing? "What the hell is this stuff?"

The Molly coat stopped arguing with Sherlock long enough to reply, "That's the problem. We don't know. We're supposed to document everything that goes into and out of the shared lab spaces, in case something like this happens; but there is nothing from Dr Griffin. Nothing. According to lab protocol, none of that should have been here at all."

"Uh-oh," John whispered. "Secret experiments that can make someone invisible can not be a good thing."

"Uh-oh, indeed," Sherlock deadpanned.

"It's like Baskerville all over again, isn't it?" John groaned.

"On a much smaller scale and without government sanction, I believe so," Sherlock agreed. Then he went silent for a long moment while John and, presumably, Molly watched him think. Finally, nearly a full minute and a half later, he spoke again. "We need to get out of here before Griffin comes back to work on his project. If he suspects something like this happened, who knows what he might do. John, collect samples of everything on the floor. Carefully."

John nodded and began to search for something to store the samples in.

"I'll arrange the scene to look like the cabinet locks simply gave away on their own." Sherlock cleared his throat and flushed as he rapidly spit out the next bit. "Molly, take off all of your clothes."

Molly squeaked. "What? Why?"

"Because a walking set of clothing, worn by an invisible woman, would be an extremely memorable occurrence. Our goal is to slip out of here undetected, is it not?"

"He, uh, he has a point." John got on the floor once again and began to gather as much of the mess as he could without making it obvious that someone had tampered with it.

Slowly, the lab coat slipped off invisible shoulders and was carefully folded and placed upon the closest lab table. It was immediately followed by Molly's sensible shoes and colourful socks. Then came her jumper.

"I can't believe I'm doing this," Molly muttered. "I never, in my entire life, imagined I'd be stripping down to my skin in front of you two."

"Nor did I," Sherlock agreed, clearly distracted by the precarious balancing act he was attempting with several pieces of delicate equipment. "I always assumed John wouldn't be there."

Molly's pants dropped to the floor as she once again squeaked, "What?"

John's "Pardon?" was deeper, but no less surprised.

"Hmm?" Sherlock finished arranging the cabinets to his satisfaction and carefully stepped over John. "Well, since we're nearly done, I'll go find a satchel or something so we can carry Molly's things and the samples without attracting attention."

As soon as the door closed behind him, John heard Molly choke out a very confused, "Did he just… Did I imagine… What?"

And that was when John realized the cab ride to Baker Street was going to be very, very interesting.


End file.
